Scribus is an open source desktop publishing software, similar to its proprietary counterparts like Adobe InDesign and PagePlus. Because of its open-sourceness, it has native versions available for Linux, Mac and Windows.

The program supports most major image formats, including SVG. It can handle CMYK colours and has ICC colour management. Publications can be exported as PDF files, but PDF files cannot be imported or edited afterwards. Due to potential legal issues and the difficulty of their reverse engineering, Scribus cannot read or write the native formats of commercial programs. The program itself is written in C++, but it has built-in scripting using Python.